Attitude...it'll be the death of me yet!

Ephesians 4:21-24

     "Since you have heard about Jesus and have learned the truth that comes from him, 22 throw off your old sinful nature and your former way of life, which is corrupted by lust and deception. 23 Instead, let the Spirit renew your thoughts and attitudes. 24 Put on your new nature, created to be like God—truly righteous and holy."

Attitude: manner, disposition, feeling, position, etc., with regard to a person or thing; tendency or orientation, especially of the mind: a negative attitude; group attitudes. At least that's how it's defined by my good friend dictionary.com.

In this day and age, we tend to associate the word attitude with a BAD attitude, and that's what I'm going to talk about today. MY bad attitude. Through a series of events, I went to bed last night with a bad attitude and woke up with one too. My morning went according to my attitude about it, I was barely able to keep my eyes dry and was just not willing to even TRY smiling. I'm still having difficulties with that aspect, and it's been 3 hours since I got to work.

I know that my attitude isn't pleasing to God, I knew it from the start. In fact, I knew when I was reading my Bible this morning that I'd have to write this blog about my attitude. So as soon as I got to work, I looked up this verse about attitude. It's funny, but the Bible doesn't use the word attitude with a negative connotation much, it mostly talks about an attitude of prayer, which got me thinking that I needed to pray about my attitude. So when I'd emailed my husband and found out his attitude wasn't much better (I had emailed him to ask him to pray for me), I put into practice what I've always preached. I stopped what I was doing, and prayed. I've found a little "help" to my prayer life, that is, I type out my prayers. Well, that's not always true, but if I'm going to pray for someone because of an email request then I pray right then and there, and type that prayer out in the email and return it to the person making the request. My best friend and I have been doing this for awhile now, and I know that, at least in my case, it's really helped me to keep my promise to pray for the person. So I typed in my email to my husband, a prayer for the both of us. I started to feel better at that point, but I was still struggling. So my best friend sent me a prayer email as well. The words really spoke to me, and really helped to heal me at that time. Here are the words that helped me.

Lord, I know that you love us. I know that you NEVER want us unhappy or upset. I pray for my best friend right now! I pray that you would intervene in her attitude and I pray that you would give her a peace and comfort like she has never known today! I pray Lord, that you will calm her nerves and help her to just feel your presence! We thank you for ALL that you have done for us and ALL that you are going to do for us! WE LOVE YOU LORD!!! Amen

These simple words, spoken in love have been acting together with my prayer from earlier to heal my attitude. I won't profess that I'm totally healed of it, because I'm not, I'm still struggling to smile, and when I do manage to get the smile out, it's lasting mere seconds. I do know though, that my attitude is less dark, and I'm not on the verge of tears anymore. I can still use prayers, as can my husband; but I am healing, and YES, the Lord is answering our prayers to make me new!